OHA TRUSTEES SELECT NEW CHAIR AND LEADERSHIP
News Release from OHA, February 9, 2017
HONOLULU (February 9, 2017) – The Office of Hawaiian Affairs Board of Trustees selected Molokaʻi and Lānaʻi Trustee Colette Y. Machado as its new chair today.
Chair Machado succeeds At-Large Trustee Leinaʻala Ahu Isa, Ph.D., who was installed as acting chair during a special board meeting on February 2. Trustee Machado, who was first elected to the OHA Board in 1996, previously served as OHA chair from December 2010 through November 2014.
“I am grateful that my fellow trustees have given me a second chance to lead them,” Chair Machado said. “My goal is bring stability to the agency and rebuild our hale. We need to work together at the board level and with staff – embrace one and another with aloha so we can move forward for our Lāhui.”
Trustees also filled the remaining board leadership positions during today’s re-organization meeting. Kauaʻi and Niʻihau Trustee Dan Ahuna was named board vice chair.
Maui Trustee Carmen “Hulu” Lindsey will remain chair of the board’s Committee on Resource Management, and At-Large Trustee John D. Waiheʻe IV will serve as the committee’s vice chair.
Hawaiʻi Island Trustee Robert K. Lindsey Jr. was selected to chair the board’s Committee on Beneficiary Advocacy and Empowerment, and Trustee Ahuna was elected as the committee’s vice chair.
---30---
NOTE: During the nomination process, OHA Trustee Dr. Kelii Akina asked questions of the candidates for Board Chair about their support for a financial audit and management review. In response, Machado committed to the financial audit and management review and Chair Machado appointed Trustee Hulu Lindsey to an ad hoc committee to oversee the audit and procurement of firms to conduct the audit. Members of that ad hoc committee are therefore now Trustee Hulu Lindsey, trustee Akina and Paul Harleman.
COVERAGE:
SA: “I’m not here to make pilikia (trouble),” Machado said.
SA: As for Crabbe, Machado said, the board needs to look at areas where it can increase Crabbe’s “capacity” and improve him as a CEO.
HNN: Amid leadership turmoil, OHA board votes in new chair